


Phaedrus and the Madness of Love.

by neocortex hunters (doubleinfinity)



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Aftercare, Canon-Typical Violence, Character Study, Dark Will, Fireplaces, Hannibal Loves Will, Killing Together, M/M, Murder Husbands, Weird Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-11
Updated: 2016-12-11
Packaged: 2018-09-07 23:12:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,106
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8820067
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/doubleinfinity/pseuds/neocortex%20hunters
Summary: His equal, in every way.Will is reluctant to accept the sensations around him; his body shrivels with discomfort.  But when Hannibal lets Will do all the work, watching Will hunt down the victim and tear him apart, he watches the boy transform into a primal grace vacant of anxiety.  He will culture this.





	

A red flash circles Hannibal’s sclera as he tracks the movement with his eyes. Will’s leap from one point to the next; he does not know the smoothness of a following motion; he is always making this harder on himself. The vermillion beam is centered in Will’s eyes, though, and no amount of exhausting it can make the chemical informing his ridged wrath decrease. Hannibal has learned to own his anger. He puts it on chains and lets it direct him, allows its jaws to open and snap at whatever Hannibal points it to, but he can yank it back and break its neck if he needs. He lusts after the way that Will has no qualms with unleashing his rage and letting it become him. Hannibal will capture and hold down the victim when Will is too distracted to methodically trace the game into a corner, and he never has to worry about the messes he makes. He knows Hannibal will protect him when he is too psychologically blinded by fury to attend to safety measures.

Will’s shoulders slump and he drags himself up from the floor, shine coating his eyes. Hannibal picks at his cuffs, smoothing the cloth creases contained beneath his clear suit, from which blood is differing, his spectator status. For a moment, Will’s swirling eyes briefly lock onto Hannibal’s gaze through the crystalizing mist of gore. He reads the older’s question as he surfaces, the chin tilt and narrowed eyelids that are trying to discern if Will has had his fill. Will holds contact for seconds longer and then turns around and submerges again, diving back into the pounds of flesh and their gateway to rivers of blood.

“Entropic mutilation,” Hannibal verbally observes while drawing nearer to his crouched friend, who is slashing at the body on the floor, still very warm from the acceleration of adrenaline that is now all over Will’s flannel and denim. He places a hand on the boy’s shoulder, just enough pressure to wake up Will’s second awareness. “You value this over acuity now.” If it had been a question, it would have been rhetorical.

Grimly supercilious, Will looks grotesquely gorgeous with crimson rivulets on the edges of his eyelashes. “And I thought, Hannibal, that our therapeutic relationship was best left aside on nights of killing.”

Hannibal slips through Will’s fingers to pluck the knife out of his grasp, giving the other no choice but to make contact with him again. Will stands up, straighter than before. “And a sense of logic put aside during the explosion of pleasure is ideal as well,” Hannibal responds, “But I stand rational before you as you lose yourself to the heady sensation of the hunt. Even if I had joined in your indulgence, my endless curiosity of you would not have been sidelined. Nothing is consuming enough to disrupt my cognition of you.”

“Some of us feel, rather than calculate.” Will’s presented dimple is goading, and with quick shoulders, he turns from Hannibal and takes his tool back from between the older’s admitting knuckles, dropping onto his heels to examine, with clarity, the disfigurement below. “Your appetite has decreased, you don’t join me so often.” He pricks the blade below a flap of skin, sinews raw like slashed wires beneath, lifting up the outer surface to see the anatomy inside. He still feels the pulse in his neck, but the urgency it had brought is now gone. He rises and swipes the knife between folds in the hem of his shirt, cleaning it back to silver.

The sound of leather on wood pads around the floor as Hannibal walks, grabbing Will’s elbow within his fist. “You can instead easily consider that my cravings have changed. I cannot legitimately imply that I’ve satiated a need for killing, however, watching you roll in blood of your own making is sufficient enough for the moment- something corresponding to the smitten stages of first love, a new arrangement for Maslow to order.” The grasp tightens, Hannibal testing the slickness of blood between flesh and material. He growls. “And you will already make a mess in my car, as it is.”

Will drops the knife into the pocket of his pants and clings onto Hannibal, his slippery clutch wrapped around the other’s wrapped elbows. “Keep the evidence from mixing,” he states quietly, allowing his breathing and heart rate to slow incrementally. “I suppose that it is hard for you to be coated in a substance not of your making.”

The older’s eyebrow quirks. “The misdeed of the automaton is ascribed to its maker. Or do you not agree?”

Eyes hover over Hannibal’s chest, and then find his eyes, somehow, in that mass of human flesh that stays solid in all its prodding. Smugly, he lifts his arm to expose his underbelly, stained red. “Then so be my master and rinse me of this mess.”

-

Hannibal gathers Will’s clothes into the bundle of his arms, the folded, soft material warm on its way to the fireplace. Will’s sweat has soaked through the crimson flannel, creating a plume of pheromone that is already highly flammable before it even hits iron grating. Unexpectedly, the younger’s under clothing has absorbed large volumes of blood, and Will’s wholly exposed skin has the color in splashes and slashes all over, though it is his neck and jaw that have had the most coats dry around them. Almost neatly, Hannibal discards the fabric into the fire and goes to kneel by the armchair, to help Will with the washcloth that he is irritating his body with.

Delicately, Hannibal offers his hand. “One shade of red to another,” he notices as he receives the wet cloth and begins to lightly brush at the coagulated crusts of blood, scrubbing away at the gore on Will’s collar. “I trust that this urgency is aimed towards the pristine appearance of the leather of the couch, not a frantic need to get the blood off yourself.”

Will shakes, leaning back and closing his eyes as Hannibal’s hands trace the wet rag along the protrusions of his bones, cooling his neurons until they are sending slow, shining messages to his brain that indicate consolation and cleansing. He takes a grounding breath before opening his mouth. “Do you ever recognize the way that release turns the pool of trickled-down emotion, sticky and wet on the skin, from bathwater to grime? The thrill eventually gives way to leftover stains that smudge what once was untouched.”

Trailing Will’s wrist with the cloth, Hannibal cleans the skin of blood until the other’s veins can be seen again. Will uncurls his fingers as he sinks back into the chair, breathing staggered but far from sleep. The warm water brushes the in-between of his fingers, ticking the sensitive surface of his palm. “I have never had this problem,” Hannibal scrutinizes quietly as he circles his hand around Will’s second wrist, dabbing the cloth against the splatters on the boy’s knuckles. “I find supplemental pleasure in the ways that the manifestations linger. But then I suppose I am rarely nourished by anything. There is always more that I can stand to receive.”

His eyes are hazy when he opens them to find Hannibal not moving, just examining the movement of rapid motions below his lids. When their visions collide, the older returns to his work, cleaning Will of the fluid that leaked through to his torso. Hannibal continues to speak. “Do you often feel unclean?”

It’s unclear whether Will is chewing over the possible answer, or if has a hard time admitting to the sensitive subject. “I don’t always enjoy the embodiment,” he mutters with a glance in another direction. Hannibal places the wash cloth back into the bowl of warm water and leans back, giving Will’s words air to circulate. “I think that you have trained your senses to a lower threshold, which why you taste the flavor in wine and feel the spray of blood like a warm shower for your pores. I have an… involuntary similarity; it feels my neurons are all hyper-myelinated. The smell of copper and the scratches in the leather on my legs, the hair brushing my neck and the sound of you dipping into the water. I cannot separate it; it is a bolus of information that I am forced to pay attention to.”

Hannibal ponders. “I want to see you kill more, Will.”

“More?” Will tilts his head down to focus on the older.

“Yes. You seem to be very capable of attending to thrill in your unrestrained state. I am sure that you manage to feel uncomfortable, still, but I think in time, you will accept the pattern of my protection and learn that there is no danger for you. If you allow yourself to come unhinged, I will be there to keep you unconditionally safe. You feel these sensations and they are strangely painful, but it’s when you resist them that you find yourself suffering. Even at risk of the unpleasant mess that you will have to deal with later, I think you should be allowed to find yourself in situations of becoming totally submerged in these feelings which you are capable of. I watch you coat yourself with blood as if your skin were to flourish in it.”

Lifting himself up by the arms of the chair, Will gets up and walks to the fireplace, watching the remaining threads of his clothing shrivel and degrade into ash. The blaze casts cold flickers of orange around his eyes, illuminating their glossy coating. His naked body is warm and absorbent, accepting the heat. “I’m not sure that your intentions are selfless, Hannibal,” he speaks to the flame.

He feels Hannibal come up behind him and fit his clothed body to that of Will’s uncovered frame, insulting his second half, facing away from the fire. “In earnest, neither of ours are,” he murmurs before pressing his open lips to the side of Will’s neck, grasping the boy’s shoulder with his hand. “I have been considering, and I want to inquire now, Will, what the quality of sexual pleasure has been for you in the past.”

Hannibal can barely sense the muscular rigidity that Will would never allow to underlie the timbre of his voice. “The same amount that any person’s body reserves for the motivation of saving one’s species. Though,” he adds coldly, “You saw to it that I was not capable.” He is grateful for the smile he does not have to see.

“I will not make detailed assumptions about the way in which you take prying questions as an opportunity to insult,” the male chides, sliding his hand down Will’s arm to stop at the bend in his elbow. “I suspect that you have found more outlets than murder which alleviate you of a constant badgering of stimulating. I am curious if climax is one of those.” He cocks his head so that Will’s hair falls into a new position on him, burying his eyes slightly into the nape of his neck, where the faintest note of blood audibly throbs.

“There is,” Will speaks genuinely now, squinting his eyes as the fire splits the chemistry of a log, raising the wooden surface with a crackle, “A distinct difference between murder and sex, if that’s what you’re getting at. Instead of working towards a resolution, the cycle is constantly fluctuating between different points. Eventually the man will die, but that doesn’t end the immersion the way that orgasm is a draining function for sexual instinct.”

Hannibal’s free hand comes to grip Will around the hip, barely a curl to his fingers. “In spite of the cultural assumption, it does not have to be that way. This is not a cup that must overflow. I don’t know for certain that you have ever been with somebody who wishes to arouse your mind twice as much as your body. Your body is a means to a higher cognitive experience.”

He feels a squirm in Will’s movement now, does not tighten his clutch, but lets Will slip free. The younger turns to bring his back against the fireplace’s outer grate, facing Hannibal. The older is looking back at him steadily, folding his hands together in front of him.

“You have not considered intimacy with a man before this point.”

Will angles his head thoughtfully. “You are no man.”

“We are beings,” Hannibal affirms, brushing residual flakes of Will’s victim’s blood from his own hands. “I want you to sit down on the brick below you, as close to the fire as you can manage, and tell me about what it felt like to take that man’s life tonight. I want to know the details from not what I observed, what you as an inner creature experienced.”

Unsure of himself, Will glances at the fireplace’s extension before carefully slinking down and resting himself over it. The bricks are mildly warm but sting with cold in comparison to the rough, grating heat of the swelter behind him. He raises his head to see Hannibal’s calculated gaze, the male’s lip posed on its next sentence already. Will lifts his eyes and all traces of Hannibal’s verbal initiative are stifled.

“You absorb the things you mark, Hannibal. Anything that mimics any normal human’s sensation of love is a thing that you devour.” He tucks his legs beneath him and lets his arms rest on them, fingers lightly brushing the floor. “I don’t think that you can be satisfied by anybody unless you have seen their totality, and that includes the succession of every gesture, every facial expression, made before death. And so you must tell me if your end at this point is to kill me.” He challenges with his eyes.

“I promise,” Hannibal begins slowly, “That I will be scarce to harm you, even with certainty, if you were to ask me to.” He looks off to the side and then returns to Will’s face, smiling. Then he changes the topic with a careful blending of realities. “However, I must ask you to not move from your place on the floor, however uncomfortable it becomes.”

Already, Will can explicitly feel the unpleasant and unexpected convex of the texture below him; the heat poking into his back and the stiffness of his muscles in a position that he has not adjusted for means of comfort yet.

Hannibal watches too long, silent. On the ground, Will shifts. He is thinking about telling Hannibal that this is not enjoyable, but something makes him close his eyes and swallow the words deep into a cavity.

“Tell me about the experience now,” the outer voice provides for him, prompting. “The killing.”

“Um,” Will hums softly, thinking, attention fleeing from the immediate room as he activates recall. “I remember that I had no personal attachment to him, other than the private tether that the three of us shared in that moment. There were… ways, however, means of justification, if in the curve of his fingers or a fresh mark on his jaw- there are always ways to create stories that illustrate somebody as deserving the mutilation, regardless of the lack of backstory provided. I felt as if succinct, sharp, sterling penetration was sufficient enough to deliver the holistic map of sins into him and expire them, if in exchange for one of my own.” He opens his eyes to depreciate himself with a smile. “And then also, I just like the sound of ripping skin.”

At his own mention of flesh, Will becomes brutally aware of the fire behind him and squirms fitfully.

“You’re not in pain, though it may feel that way.” Hannibal extends his hand down, calling Will to his feet. The younger rises to his heels and quickly shuffles away from the open flame, staggering over the carpet. “Your senses are hyper-active, and you have not learned how to quiet each one individually, save for the inattention that arises when you are mentally distracted. The mechanical receptors in your skin too quickly turn to pain, shifting from innocuous sensation to unbearable perception. I want to help you change what you feel.”

Placing a hand against the small of his back, Will feels the residuum of heat within his skin transfer into his palm. He can’t help but allow his eyes a fleeting return to the hushed snapping of wood, the chemical splintering of smoke and combustion that is severing the bark from its body.

There is no betrayal of Hannibal’s recognition to be measured, but Will has grown accustomed to expecting it. Hannibal’s calculations produce volumes- unethical assumptions that always seem to be, or as a result of his suggestions become, correct. “At this very moment, you are the lumber,” he grasps after following Will’s eyes to the firewood. He averts his vision to gather his ideations, the affirmation of Will’s presence too devastating to his thought process. “I have to apologize as I change my approach; I don’t think that the problem you have is with the sensitivity of your skin. It seems that you instead do not have a distinct conception of what you are in the environment- your flesh may become fur or wood much more hastily than it will remain your own. The isolated sensations are lost on their way to your brain and by the time they return, it is hard to even remember what the stark experience was to begin with.”

Will produces a shallow smile while smoke seems to spill from beneath his fingernails. “Empathy was always a drawing point for you, Dr. Lecter. The best way for somebody to maintain an unalloyed comprehension of you is to physically become you.”

The shine returns to Hannibal’s covetous eyes. “There remains an unparalleled intrusion when a severed tree may be just as willing to take my place,” he recounts playfully, peeking into Will’s wavering focus.

Hannibal beckons Will against him, pulling the younger against his body. “You will quickly find that the least painful manifestation you can ever hope to experience is in myself. I deeply enjoy the way that my soul fills into these human limbs, including the rest of my fragile anatomy which I have strengthened through the concentrated honing of my senses. Sink between my layers of skin and I can absolutely guarantee that you will no longer dislike the sensation of directing a human vessel.”

“You’ll cage me in,” Will whispers, quietly, his voice not in sync with the cackle of the fire anymore.

All teeth come out for a grin. He whispers back. “I will let you out to kill every so often.”


End file.
